One thing I have wanted to try for a while now with my kiddos is searching for sharks teeth down in Calvert County. Unfortunately, those beaches have been crazy busy! Then I heard about Purse State Park in Charles County over on the Potomac River. It sounded great!
The information I gleaned from the internet was a bit vague on the exact location to park as Purse has been subsumed into Namjemoy WMA. A mom in my local moms group was able to pass on general directions for where to park, and the location of the trail down to the water. The address online is listed as 10200 Riverside Rd, Namjemoy, MD. Be forewarned! This address takes you a good mile plus further down the road than you need to go! The dirt parking lot is on the left side of the road if you are coming from the north. The trail starts across the street. There is only room for ten or so cars in the lot. When we arrived today, shortly before 10am, the lot was already full. We parked on the side of the road.
Behind the yellow gate, we followed a fairly flat and wide dirt path. The trail isn’t marked, but it also isn’t a long hike down to the river. It took us about 15 minutes moving at toddler speed. There is one spot that looks like a fork in the trail, stick to the left.
All three girls were excited and helped by carrying shovels, pails, and sifters. Whatever you do, don’t forget something to sift the sand with! You can use a cheap plastic sand sifter or take a kitchen colander with you.
When you see the chimney, you are pretty much there. The last bit of the hike is a steep, slippery downhill scramble to the beach.
The beach itself is narrow, only a few feet wide, but what makes this place great is the length of the beach section. It stretches out in long crescent encircling Wades Bay. We needed to walk past people, sometimes closely, but we were able to find a shady spot away from people to drop our stuff and spread out. We even saw some people wearing masks.
We brought our large beach blanket, but there wasn’t room enough to spread it out. Plus the beach is mostly small pebbles, not the most comfortable surface to sit on. We put a towel down for the kids to eat lunch on and hubby and I sat on a log near the high tide mark. If you have swim shoes, def bring them! We brought the girls’ crocs, but these proved to be too light for them to use when swimming. All of us ended up staying barefoot and picking our steps carefully. The water was nice and warm, and Stormy and Rainbow has a blast swimming!
Pebble was a little nervous about the small waves and stuck close to my husband and me. She was happy to help my hubby by shoveling sand and rocks into the sifter. I found the first tooth, but Pebble found the largest. We found a lot of teeth, but they were tiny, smaller than my thumbnail. Next time we go, we want to walk further down the beach and see if we can find bigger teeth.
It was an amazing outing! We all had a blast, and the girls were thrilled when we stopped for ice cream on our way home.
Some things to note… Check the tides in advance of visiting. At high tide, there is no beach. We went after low tide and much of our area was rapidly being covered by water when we left around 1pm. I’m including the website of the site I used. When the site asks for a location along the Potomac, use Liverpool Point, MD. Tidal Chart
Queen Anne’s County across the Bay Bridge has closed its beaches to non residents. They did so due to the number of people visiting and not being considerate. Garbage should never be left behind. You pack it in, you pack it out! Unfortunately, we saw evidence this is happening here at the Purse area as well. We saw discarded cans, cups, swim diapers, etc. We assumed rangers who work here had cleaned the beach recently as we passed a spot where five bags of garbage had been collected. Please bring a bag for your garbage and take it home! Don’t spoil such a beautiful place! Rainbow and Stormy are already begging to go back, and we definitely plan to! Happy trails!
